Liffe coffee rebounds

Liffe September robusta coffee ended $103 higher at $2,319 a tonne on Friday. Market rebounded strongly after sliding to its lowest level in almost five months during the previous session boosted mainly by technically-driven buying. Liffe September cocoa ended 13 pounds lower at 1,881 pounds a tonne. Prices fell back slightly in a modest setback following strong gains earlier in the week with producer selling helping to cap the advance.
Liffe August white sugar closes $1.30 higher at $734.60 per tonne. Market continues to hover just below a three-month peak set earlier in the week. "We had a bit of a macro recovery early in the day, it's now turned sour. A lot of people are just trying to make sense of the volatility we saw in the markets," said Luis Rangel, vice-president of commodity derivatives with ICAP North America in New Jersey. Raw sugar tumbled 6.5 percent Thursday and arabica dropped to a five month low, but both markets recovered to settle firm.
ICE sugar futures fell along with other commodities on Friday, pressured further from expectations of a rise in cane plantings in India, the world's No 2 sugar producer, in 2011/12 and by prospects that India could approve further open general license (OGL) exports in coming months.
"If the next couple of months prove to have good rainfall then it's conceivable that the authorities might widen OGL export permits to a further 500,000 tonnes," VM Group and ABN Amro said in their latest Agricommodities Monthly report. India's government on Thursday allowed 500,000 tonnes of unrestricted sugar exports. "The Indian export release will affect the third-quarter trade flow, but it seems worries about Brazil's output are still pre-eminent," said Nick Penney of brokerage Sucden Financial, about the market still underpinned by Brazil's situation.
Europe's debt problems helped the dollar index rebound, which pressured oil and, in turn, other commodities. Liffe robusta coffee clawed back losses from the past three sessions on investor buying, while ICE arabicas corrected up from Thursday's five-month lows. Dealers talked of tight availability of robustas before the next Vietnamese harvest.
"You have a very tight crop in Indonesia. You also have rising differentials in robusta so that's the supportive side," Rangel said. A large 2010/11 surplus weighed on the cocoa market as favourable weather in West Africa, which supplies two thirds of the world's cocoa, has led to a bumper 2010/11 crop.